Another drone related aircraft incident

[sar104]

I disagree that a self serving statement with no corroboration is evidence, but I'm sure we can agree to disagree.

You can hold any opinion you like, but the NTSB regards it as evidence and that is the opinion that counts.

EDIT: To clarify - the pilot account may seem a bit too convenient or even unconvincing but pilots are held to high reporting standards and their accounts are afforded the status of evidence by the NTSB. Whether or not pilot error contributed to this incident, I'd be very surprised if the report of the Phantom turned out to be fabricated.

 

[Geo_in_KS]

My first thought on this whole thing, not considering the fact that a helicopter was close to a tree, or any other factors, was; if I had a choice to clip a drone or a tree, I'd hit the drone.

 

[mick]

I am very curious to see how this pans out. I can not understand why a professional pilot would choose to clip a tree over the drone. The drone at best would of caused a forced emergency landing if it affected the rotors/ drive train in any way. Even a small heli would get down safely from the impact i suspect of something phantom sized.

Its like a pilot crashing an aircraft to avoid a bird strike.....hmmmm

 

[BigAl07]

Keep in mind that it's easy for us to sit here at our desk(table, laptop etc) and second guess their every move. Odds are this all happened very quickly and possibly was a knee-jerk reaction due to something suddenly coming into their immediate vicinity. I seriously doubt anyone had time to develop the mindset of "I'll avoid the drone and take my chances hitting the tree/bush/shrub".

 

[mick]

Keep in mind that it's easy for us to sit here at our desk(table, laptop etc) and second guess their every move. Odds are this all happened very quickly and possibly was a knee-jerk reaction due to something suddenly coming into their immediate vicinity. I seriously doubt anyone had time to develop the mindset of "I'll avoid the drone and take my chances hitting the tree/bush/shrub".

Thats why im curious about the details of the final report, why was he close to a tree in the first place with a student on board that he hit it full stop avoiding anything? Was the student flying at the time? What are the other variables?

Wait and see ey.

 

[Geo_in_KS]

Keep in mind that it's easy for us to sit here at our desk(table, laptop etc) and second guess their every move. Odds are this all happened very quickly and possibly was a knee-jerk reaction due to something suddenly coming into their immediate vicinity. I seriously doubt anyone had time to develop the mindset of "I'll avoid the drone and take my chances hitting the tree/bush/shrub".

I absolutely understand and agree with you Al. Nobody whatsoever can imagine the thoughts of someone involved in the actual incident except them.
I know a few people have given opinions etc, which is fine. I really dont have any opinion one way or the other, I guess thinking about it a bit more now, even though a drone doesnt seem very significant maybe it suddenly appeared right in front of them and looked huge so they quick jerked the stick, who knows.
Regardless of any of it, the drone operator, in my opinion was wrong.

I was flying the other day over a construction site, I saw a small plane approaching from my right (likely at 1500-2500' AGL or more), I was at maybe 200', but there is no way I would take any chances, I descended and flew back close to where i was standing. Obviously if someone was doing a shoot or something maybe evasive measures wouldn't be necessary but I was able to do it.

 

[mick]

I absolutely understand and agree with you Al. Nobody whatsoever can imagine the thoughts of someone involved in the actual incident except them.
I know a few people have given opinions etc, which is fine. I really dont have any opinion one way or the other, I guess thinking about it a bit more now, even though a drone doesnt seem very significant maybe it suddenly appeared right in front of them and looked huge so they quick jerked the stick, who knows.
Regardless of any of it, the drone operator, in my opinion was wrong.

I was flying the other day over a construction site, I saw a small plane approaching from my right (likely at 1500-2500' AGL or more), I was at maybe 200', but there is no way I would take any chances, I descended and flew back close to where i was standing. Obviously if someone was doing a shoot or something maybe evasive measures wouldn't be necessary but I was able to do it.

As much as we are responsible to fly safely etc. A drone and aircraft should never really cross paths anyway altitude wise so if you are within your alt zone the pilot should be sticking to his too and you dont have to worry about overhead aircraft as they should be well above you in their allocated space.

We have had issues with microlights flying 50ft above our test field and i didnt let them keep on doing it. I videoed them and reported them to the CAA...They got one hell of a telling off but if an incident had occurred who would be to blame, the pilot ultimately as he is breaching the alt rules he has to follow. Thats why i want to hear more details on this case. It could be errors all round.

Helis shouldn't be low either except around their agreed landing/ take off zones as we as autonomous operators have been allocated that airspace below them to avoid issues. One way or another someone has breached the rules and we will have to wait and see.

Its either a drone operator flying in the wrong place or a heli pilot too low where he should not have been. They dont own the lower airspace anymore, its been allocated to us for a reason.

I am posting this of course on my limited knowledge of US air regs so if i am wrong by all means correct me.

 

[BigAl07]

Thats why im curious about the details of the final report, why was he close to a tree in the first place with a student on board that he hit it full stop avoiding anything? Was the student flying at the time? What are the other variables?

Wait and see ey.

*From one of the reports I saw early on*
Initially the student was flying and the instructor took control and the tail rotor impacted a shrub/plant in the evasive maneuver. They did an emergency landing due to tail rotor damage with not personal injury reported.

 

[mick]

*From one of the reports I saw early on*
Initially the student was flying and the instructor took control and the tail rotor impacted a shrub/plant in the evasive maneuver. They did an emergency landing due to tail rotor damage with not personal injury reported.

Well its all down to who was flying in the right place it seems then ey.

There is plenty of idiots flying drones these days, as a long term RC flyer it drives me mad as even the flying clubs over here are scared of them due to fools flying them badly.

But lets see what appears in the wash.

 

[ArrUnTuS]

I absolutely understand and agree with you Al. Nobody whatsoever can imagine the thoughts of someone involved in the actual incident except them.
I know a few people have given opinions etc, which is fine. I really dont have any opinion one way or the other, I guess thinking about it a bit more now, even though a drone doesnt seem very significant maybe it suddenly appeared right in front of them and looked huge so they quick jerked the stick, who knows.
Regardless of any of it, the drone operator, in my opinion was wrong.

I was flying the other day over a construction site, I saw a small plane approaching from my right (likely at 1500-2500' AGL or more), I was at maybe 200', but there is no way I would take any chances, I descended and flew back close to where i was standing. Obviously if someone was doing a shoot or something maybe evasive measures wouldn't be necessary but I was able to do it.

I think you've introduced a very important point. The ceiling that piloted aircraft now have. It's 500 feet AGL with a 100-foot safety margin with the drones. That's why the drone ceiling is 400 feet.

Another important point is to determine who was in whose airspace. That's a very important detail.

You said you did an evasion maneuver and that with a margin of at least 1000 feet. Better safety, well done. Not long ago I had to do the same thing, I couldn't point the plate or take an image of a plane flying directly against the drone. I couldn't open a formal incident. It was a mono-engine plane with 2 seats. Its ground is 500 feet AGL and it flew at less than 300 feet. I still told AESA and its answer was, "Aircraft have altimeters, but many of them cannot know their exact height if they do not consult navigation charts in real time or use digital/GPS measuring instruments". Since I didn't have the license plate, everything happened so fast, I couldn't do more. Safety first and then we'll see the responsibilities.

By this I mean, that it is not always the drone pilots who do the wrong thing. As humans, we all get mistaken. The big difference is that we don't risk our lives riding a drone. This is what we must bear in mind and try to live together flying in the sky.

 

[colinjfischer]

I brief my students to treat Drone-strikes and Bird Strikes the same way. I tell them that the pilot-flying (usually them) keeps flying until I want to take the controls, and that we will initiate a climb (if we can) or if we are on final in a position land, continue the landing. I don't know what a Phantom 3 could do to a Cessna or a Piper, and I am not keen to find out, but I imagine it would be comparable to a larger bird like a goose or a vulture.

One thing that isn't really talked about are military training routes. They are located all over the US and are published on sectional charts. Aircraft flying these routes are usually flying fast (200+ knots) and low (100 -500 ft AGL). So, when you are flying your drone try and check to see if there are MTRs around. They are labelled in Grey with either a "VR" or "IR" attached to their name.

i.e:



Edit: Also - I was doing a ferry flight to Lynchburg, VA 2 weeks ago and while on approach, the tower made an "Attention all aircraft" call to let us know there was a small drone in the traffic pattern and had caused a near-miss with one of the light twins. An aircraft traffic pattern is .7-.8 nm from the airport and generally 1,000 ft AGL, so the drone pilot was clearly in the wrong. These incidents are increasing and that is a bad thing.

 

[mick]

These incidents are increasing and that is a bad thing.

Idiots...They are among us

And you should see Uk military maps, the best we have to use is a barely a4 joke of a map i have had to add all the lat long lines on myself



The first meme i have felt the need to use in 10 years haha

 

[colinjfischer]

Idiots...They are among us

Unfortunately that's true of any large group of people. Occasionally, I have to give a flight review to someone and they are appalling pilots and I don't sign them off. Even going through the crucible of the FAA examiner fails to weed them out, although the great part about the industry is that you have to get yourself reviewed and we police our own. I suppose that is going to start happening to drone pilots in the not-too-distant future.

 

[ArrUnTuS]

Unfortunately that's true of any large group of people. Occasionally, I have to give a flight review to someone and they are appalling pilots and I don't sign them off. Even going through the crucible of the FAA examiner fails to weed them out, although the great part about the industry is that you have to get yourself reviewed and we police our own. I suppose that is going to start happening to drone pilots in the not-too-distant future.

It's already happening to us. Since the approval of the latest regulations, AESA obliges us to make flights of all types declared in the safety study. It's one way of telling you have to be in good shape

 

[Southern Pirate]

I live in South Carolina and I know the area where this accident occurred. It would appear that who ever this drone pilot is, is being blamed for this accident without any facts coming out. What if the drone was being flown in unrestricted air space and under 400 feet, would that drone pilot be in the right? What would happen if the helicopter pilot then entered that air space unexpectedly and the drone pilot was attempting to move their craft from the area. Now the drone would have to have been under 400 feet because the helicopter pilot determined his only recourse was to land. In the open sky there are numerous directions for a helicopter to go. I can tell you that here in South Carolina, I have not come across any tree that is any where close to 400 feet tall. Now I have not heard if this drone pilot has been found but to automatically place the blame on a drone pilot is not right until all the facts have come to light.

 

[ArrUnTuS]

I live in South Carolina and I know the area where this accident occurred. It would appear that who ever this drone pilot is, is being blamed for this accident without any facts coming out. What if the drone was being flown in unrestricted air space and under 400 feet, would that drone pilot be in the right? What would happen if the helicopter pilot then entered that air space unexpectedly and the drone pilot was attempting to move their craft from the area. Now the drone would have to have been under 400 feet because the helicopter pilot determined his only recourse was to land. In the open sky there are numerous directions for a helicopter to go. I can tell you that here in South Carolina, I have not come across any tree that is any where close to 400 feet tall. Now I have not heard if this drone pilot has been found but to automatically place the blame on a drone pilot is not right until all the facts have come to light.

Buddy, the news isn't written on paper taken from a 400 foot tree. You just have to take a little look at what's on the news.

A helicopter’s crash landing

My English is very bad but I understand that when it was landing it crashed. Am I wrong?

Anyway, if it's an airport it doesn't matter that the drone is below 400 feet.

 

[BigAl07]

I live in South Carolina and I know the area where this accident occurred. It would appear that who ever this drone pilot is, is being blamed for this accident without any facts coming out. What if the drone was being flown in unrestricted air space and under 400 feet, would that drone pilot be in the right? What would happen if the helicopter pilot then entered that air space unexpectedly and the drone pilot was attempting to move their craft from the area. Now the drone would have to have been under 400 feet because the helicopter pilot determined his only recourse was to land. In the open sky there are numerous directions for a helicopter to go. I can tell you that here in South Carolina, I have not come across any tree that is any where close to 400 feet tall. Now I have not heard if this drone pilot has been found but to automatically place the blame on a drone pilot is not right until all the facts have come to light.

Without more details EVERYTHING we say is guesses and assumptions but . . .

You do realize that helicopters are not required to maintain the 500'AGL rule? By the very nature of their design to hover in place they are allowed to fly below 500' AGL so long as they can make a safe landing should they experience engine failure. The 400' thing doesn't have any weight in this argument.

The rule of all sUAS is See & Avoid all other aircraft. I think it's specifically said "To fly in a manner that does not disrupt manned aircraft in flight". It sounds like one way or another the sUAS operation did disrupt the flight of the manned aircraft. If the manned aircraft had to take evasive action to avoid impact the sUAS was clearly very much at fault. See & Avoid is not an option nor is it something that can be delayed.

I'm not placing full blame on the sUAS operator because in manned aviation we are taught to always FLY THE AIRCRAFT and apparently in this situation the P-I-C allowed the tailrotor to strike a tree/shrub on the ground in the avoidance of a perceived sUAS. It's very possible this was a "knee-jerk" reaction that happened in an area that allowed for a tail rotor strike. Obviously if they would have had time and altitude they might have made different decisions but in the heat of the moment who knows?

It's easy for us to sit in our comfy chairs and second-guess what happened. All we really know is we have a report of 2 witnesses seeing a sUAS and in an attempt to avoid it, the tail rotor impacted some type of vegetation.

 

[ArrUnTuS]

Since the information is so scarce and 99% of the news I have found about this accident is a copy and glue of what has been published here, I have managed to find another in which it is indicated that a low altitude training flight was being performed. This already shows that they had to be allowed to do so.

I am now raising a major problem that has not occurred to me until now. Professional pilots are forced to know the different types of air spaces, we are forced to consult the weather charts, we are forced......, we are forced to consult the NOTAMs of the flight area just before flying. This last point is where I wanted to be. An amateur has no knowledge of any of the above. Hopefully, he can check that it is no controlled air space. If in that airspace, where without more information he could fly a drone, it is temporarily restricted, What's the result?

I don't know in your countries, but here for about 50 years there is a law, which has now been altered by the new drone laws, that prevents flying model airplanes (as the drones used to be called) out of specially designated areas. Known as model airplane clubs. The reason was obvious. Preserve safety in the rest of the airspace.

Now I don't know why, even the dumbest guy in town, goes to a supermarket and buys a drone and can fly in many places without the slightest preparation, without knowing how to behave in the air where it coexists with manned aircraft. It doesn't make sense to me.

A very simple comparative example would be, the dumbest guy in town goes and buys a car. By the fact of buying it he can travel on a lot of roads without having the slightest knowledge of the road traffic rules

 

[BigAl07]

A very simple comparative example would be, the dumbest guy in town goes and buys a car. By the fact of buying it he can travel on a lot of roads without having the slightest knowledge of the road traffic rules

I completely AGREE! I think every sUAS that can fly over 100', fly autonomously, is self leveling should require a Hobby version of Part 107.

 

[HawkUAV]

This is where a transponder on the drone will help. People could stop pointing at all drones and focus on the lone idiot drone operators.